So I’m finally home after a long, productive day. I’ve kicked my feet up, laptop in my lap (makes sense), looking across Lake Union at the fingers of fog on Capitol Hill and my doggie, Cuddles, is cuddled (makes sense too) up next to me. The only thing that’s different in this picture from last night is I’m a lot more comfortable thanks to a great session with Chad Duvall at Innerconnection Therapeutic Massage this afternoon. For about 4 or 5 weeks I’ve had a pain in my right shoulder. It’s been hard to use my right arm because of it. It made it difficult during one of the busiest times of taking friends out on The Way Home during all of the Christmas Boat Parades in December. But Chad knew just what to do to work that kink out of my shoulder (really the uppermost part of my arm). He focuses on deep tissue and sports massage. He can just do a nice, relaxing massage too!

When I started this blog I mentioned I wanted to emphasize the benefits of living/working around Lake Union by introducing you to different people/places/things to do around the lake. I’m sure there will be many over the years but Chad seems like a great place to start!

The Way Home in the 2009 Christmas Boat Parade (photo courtesy of Stephan Hochhalter)

It’s the evening of January 3, 2010. Everyone is ready to officially start the “business” side of the new year tomorrow morning. Myself, I’ve been working and having a great time for the last few days. But tomorrow is the drop-dead date of “being done with the holidays” for most. I have one HUGE problem with that. My boat, The Way Home, is sitting down at Marina Mart with ALL of it’s decorations still on. This year it took 36 “man”-hours to decorate. I’m feeling a bit guilty about her sitting down there with everybody going by and laughing. I’ll feel guiltier at the end of January when I STILL won’t have it done. I have plenty of people that volunteer to decorate it the day after Thanksgiving (The Christmas Boat Parade actually has started a bit early the last few years). It’s great, I tell everybody that if they want a guaranteed seat on the boat for the finale on December 23rd off of Gasworks Park. All they have to do is show up, decorate the boat and get fed my fabulous chili and cornbread. My friends Linda Aaron, Christine Fields and Cary Gould are my faithful. Others come and go but I always have enough to make it bearable and get done before sundown as it gets mighty cold after the sun sinks below Queen Anne. I’m just not sure what the motivation is to get them to come back to take it off and store it for another year. Heck, I can’t even motivate myself to do it.